Posts Tagged ‘geting motivated to lose weight’

Sugar is E.V.I.L.  It is like a best friend who stabs you in the back.  Yes, it is yummy and it is readily available but it truly is very very bad for you, in many different ways.  In addition to being empty calories with no nutritional content, sugar burns “hotter” in your system, creating more free radicals that do various types of damage within your system.  From wrinkles to cardiovascular disease, excess sugar plays a role.

What types of sugar?  All of it (white, brown and even fruit and fruit juices, maple syrup and honey) is converted into triglycerides by the liver and are subject the damage from free radicals.  These damaging triglycerides then attack your arteries, which leads to cardiovascular disease.  Ready for this?  Cancer and tumor cells FEED off of sugar. Need i say more?

Course correction:

• Eat fruit when you crave sugar as it provides antioxidants that also fight against free radicals.
• Limit your intake of sugar in the foods you eat to a very very minimum.
• If you must have sweetness, my favorite is Stevia, a natural sweetner that is very yummy.
• Read your labels (or investigate nutritional content online) and become aware of the added sugars in the food you eat.  An easy way to check sugar content is with this super simple formula:  Take the total number of carbs from the label. Subtract the amount of fiber. Divide the remainder by 5.  Now, you have the number of teaspoons of sugar in that food.  For example:  if there are 30 grams of carbs on the label and 5 grams of fiber, that means you have 5 teaspoons of sugars in that product.  (30 minus 5 = 25.  25 divided by 5 = 5)

This week I  began a series of posts to increase your weight loss motivation. Today, let’s look at the second:

Watch What you Say and Think

You’ve probably heard the saying….”what you think about expands.” Although this is true for all areas of our life, it is particularly crucial to watch what you say and think when it comes to your health and diet.

Let’s begin with something simple. Have you ever said “I am having a really bad day”?

And guess what…..your prediction comes true….your day goes from bad to worse. This isn’t a coincidence.  When we get into this frame of mind, our thoughts can easily turn small molehills into huge, insurmountable mountains.

Yes, the way we frame these thoughts and words can really make a fundamental difference in the way we live our lives. Our thoughts and what we say can affect our day to day existence.

Just today, how many negative thoughts have you had about your willpower, your body, the way your look or feel? Have you said “I’m fat”, I don’t have will power” or “I’ll never be thin”? Each time you are negative about yourself (and really pay attention to how often this happens) you are closing off your subconscious to new ideas – you are effectively telling your subconscious that this is the way things will always be. You create self-fulfilling prophesies.

It doesn’t have to be like that.

There are plenty of studies that show that if you start to frame your thoughts in a positive manner, it can have a massive effect on your desired outcome.  You can do this by visualizing yourself at the exact weight that you want to be. Focus on how your life would be different at that weight, the things you would be able to do, how you would feel. Write those things down – something like “I am 140 pounds and enjoy a wonderful vibrant life where I buy clothes off the rack and am not embarrassed to try them on. I am able to easily climb stairs and can roll around on the floor with my children. I am excited to fly on a plane and have no concern about fitting into my seat”.  Jot down anything and everything that you can think of that will support your vision. Write this vision statement on 3 x 5 cards and place them around your office, home (especially the refrigerator) and car –places where you can see them everyday.

Even if at first you find it hard to believe the statement, read it anyway. Especially, read it to yourself in the mirror. Reading it a number of times every day will ensure that your subconscious will take note and not only influence, but support, your choices to make the statement a reality.

Need more support? One of my favorite people in the world is Dr. Joe Vitale and I’ve learned so much from the work he has created. If limiting beliefs are holding you back, I highly recommend his Awakening Course. Check it out, do the work and begin to strategically plan your life without the baggage of limiting beliefs.

Deciding to make the commitment to changing your lifestyle, lose weight and get healthy can sometimes feel like an overwhelming challenge. Often that challenge is multiplied when dieting has been a constant struggle and a history of weight loss and gain is in your past.

The exciting thing is that you can say goodbye to the past and start powerfully in your in your new commitment to health. Begin by implementing the following motivation tips which will give you new skills and slates in which to work from.

This first tip is one in a series of ways in which to finally take control of your life and health. Ready for the first? It’s really the easiest so let’s start there….

(1)    Bullet Proofing your Kitchen

All twelve step programs have the same first step – do you know what it is?

It’s admitting that you are powerless to give up the things you are addicted to, to acknowledge that you can’t resist them. And there are many things that people can become addicted to….it’s not just alcohol or drugs, but food as well.

When you finally admit this lack or power to resist food and/or the sugary beverages that you may also crave, it actually makes you more powerful, because you know that something has to be done and you are ready to take the next step.

And, come on, you already know what foods you have trouble with, so just get rid of those foods! Don’t have them around you and don’t bring them into your house. After all, if it is not there, you can’t eat it!

Bullet proof your kitchen by creating a microenvironment of health right in your house. If you know that ice cream is your weakness and that even one spoonful of ice cream will lead to eating the entire tub, then don’t keep any in the freezer– why tempt fate, or your willpower. In the struggle between Ben and Jerry’s and your willpower, your willpower will always lose. That’s because of your primitive limbic brain.

The limbic brain controls many unconscious chores for your body. Breathing in and out, blinking your eyes and flinch at a flying object all come from the instruction of this portion of your brain. The limbic brain is also responsible for your fight or flight response, your need to mate and yes…..your need to eat.

The problem is that when we were being biologically designed, fast food wasn’t on every corner and bags of calorie dense chemical cocktails couldn’t be wheeled in a cart to our car. Back then, food wasn’t plentiful and didn’t contain a great many calories. Back then, we had to work hard for our food and expended calories in hunting, gathering and preparing it. Today, sticking a hand out of the car window provides a calorie feast of non-food that our body doesn’t know how to process. But, the limbic brain doesn’t care….it urges us to eat what it sees…..and NOW. That’s why it is important to purge these nasty non-foods from your home environment, so your limbic brain doesn’t have anything to focus on.

If you live with other people, ask for their co-operation, or create an area of the kitchen that is your place and keep the rest of the kitchen off limits. And remember, the rest of your household doesn’t need to eat junk either. Be a good role model and urge the people you live with not only to support you, but to choose health from themselves as well.

Now that you’ve used this concept to make your kitchen a healthy environment, begin extending it to other parts of your life.  Bullet proof other areas of your life too by identifying “toxic situations” or “toxic friends” – those events or people who are not supporting your best life.

Did you already think of one? Now begin considering how you can bullet proof yourself from that person, limit your exposure or have the crucial conversation with them that is long past due.

Yes, when you admit you are powerless to resist, you are able to take action to create an environment that supports your goals and the commitments your have made to yourself. Why weight? Begin bullet proofing your kitchen and other areas of your life too.

I’ve heard it before….”I’ll have time to sleep when I’m dead.” And while it certainly feels that sleep is an inconvenient interruption to our 24 hour lives, a full night’s sleep is not the luxury we’ve come to consider it to be. In fact, sleep is a basic necessity for healthy hormonal balance. Plus when you dip below seven hours of quality sleep a night, you are increasing your risk of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, stroke, depression, and our immediate enemy….obesity.

Sleep researchers break sleep into five stages, of which Stage 4, or slow-wave sleep, has shown important connections to our health and weight. Stage 4 sleep occurs about an hour after we fall asleep and ideally sink into three to four times per night. During this deep, dreamless sleep, it is believed we release our greatest pulses of growth hormone, the hormone that prompts our body to burn stored fat. And it is also believed that during this stage of sleep our metabolism is regulated. So you can see that not sleeping enough or having sleep interrupted often can work against your weight loss efforts.

And you really can’t “catch up” on your sleep. Just two nights of bad sleep can cut your satiety hormone, leptin by 20% and increase ghrelin, your hunger hormone, by 30. That one-two punch to your appetite control center makes you much more likely to snack on high carb treats, which cause another downward spiral for your health. You see, other research has shown that just three nights of poor sleep made the bodies of healthy test subjects 25% less sensitive to insulin. You could expect this same level of insulin resistence in people carrying an excess of 20-30 pounds. Disturbing to say the least.

The good news is that all of these things can be correctly. You simply must make an effort, strategically plan your life in a way that allows you at least seven hours of undisturbed sleep each night. And plan your environment, darken your room, create a perfect temperature and even listen to music specifically for inducing deep sleep – one of my favorites is www.sleepsecretaudio.com. Hypnosis also works amazingly well, to calm the mind and allow you to sleep deeply – check out http://renewyoutoday.com/sleep (my affiliate link to Wendi’s amazing products).

Remember, sleep is not a luxury. It is a necessity. Don’t start your day without it!!

Most people know and understand the power of the fight or flight response – that adrenaline jumping scare that raises your fists or high-tails you out of stressful situations. But, many don’t know that our body also is equipped with what Dr. Herbert Benson calls the Relaxation Response – a physiologic state of quietude,” aahhh, doesn’t that sound nice?

Why should you be aware of this? Because in our high stressed, anxiety ridden and tension induced world, regularly tapping into the relaxation response can prevent or at least compensate for, the damage that the fight or flight response creates.

Stress is a bully. It suppresses immune function, causes heart attack and stroke, weight gain and depression. It impairs memory and worsens sexual function. Yep, stress is an energy and vitality zapping disaster.

That is why it is vitally important to tap into your body’s Relaxation Response by practicing stress management techniques. By doing so, you increase your body’s nitric oxide levels which in turn relaxes your arteries and increases blood flow to all parts of your body.

And it’s easy!!

You can reduce your stress and increase your health by doing two things:

1.    Repeat a word, sound, phrase, prayer or muscular activity.
2.    Passively disregard everyday thoughts that inevitably come to mind and return to your repetition.

Sound familiar? That’s because it is….meditation!

Pick a focus word, short phrase or prayer. Many people simply say ooommmmm. Others use a word that is important to them – love, peace, home, God. You can even use a word that you need for that day: focus, communicate, forgiveness.

Then, Sit quietly in a comfortable position, close your eyes and relax your muscles progressively. Begin with your feet, move to calves, thighs, abdomen, shoulders, head and neck. Breathe slowly and naturally and as you exhale, say your focus word.

Other thoughts will try to crowd in. As they do, simply say oh well and return to your repetition. Continue this for 10-20 minutes.

When complete, sit for a few minutes in silence. Do this daily.

There…..can you feel your arteries relax already?

A Doctor was addressing a large audience in Tampa.

‘The material we put into our stomachs is enough to have killed most of us sitting here, years ago. Red meat is awful. Soft drinks corrode your stomach lining. Chinese food is loaded with MSG. High fat diets can be disastrous, and none of us realizes the long-term harm caused by the germs in our drinking water. But there is one thing that is the most dangerous of all and we all have, or will, eat it. Can anyone here tell me what food it is that causes the most grief and suffering for years after eating it?’

After several seconds of quiet, a 75-year-old man in the front row raised his hand, and softly said, ‘Wedding Cake?’

Go ahead…..laugh! Really loud!!

This is actually nothing that a lot of us didn’t at least suspect previously, but now, study after study are proving that your positive emotions actually play a larger role in your overall health than was previously known.  It may sound hard to believe, but you can actually laugh your way to fitness.  Don’t get me wrong – you can’t eat whatever you want and expect to lose weight just by listening to a few jokes.

What you can do, however, is make a concerted effort to improve your health by channeling laughter in the right way to help flood your body with positive chemicals (produced by your brain) that do make it easier to lose weight.  Imagine the positive benefits that can be achieved simply by loving life, enjoying a laugh, while eating right and getting some exercise.

And remember this…your body doesn’t know the difference between real laughter and fake. So right now, start fake laughing….go ahead….he he he ha ha ha…..think of something funny, like the time your sibling shot milk out their nose.  Are you feeling a little smile come to your lips?  Go ahead and widen it and he he he ha ha ha some more. When you begin to feel the smile come naturally, feel a shift in your energy and a clarity of your focus. Those are the yummy feel good hormones flooding thru your body. Now….that really is something to giggle about!!!

by Lynette Patterson, ICF Certified Life and Health Coach

It’s hard to stand back and watch someone that you care about, a beautiful, amazing human being speak themselves out of being healthy. The “it’s too hard”, “I have no time”, “I don’t like the way it tastes”, “I’m too busy” excuses that rob them of their health and years of life on this planet.

So often, I find that people believe it is diet and exercise that will help them achieve their weight loss goals.

They’re wrong.

Well….not entirely, but as important as diet and exercise is to good health, it is just as important to have a attitude that will support you getting there.

A healthy body begins with a healthy mind and the six inches between your ears is the first thing to get into shape. As important as it is to remove junk food from your kitchen, it’s just as important to remove the junk from your mind. You can have all the support systems in place with all the right tools but if you have a negative attitude or your self-esteem is in the toilet, you won’t create long-term success.
Ready to become unstuck?

Creating the right attitude is so vitally important because thought IS behavior. The power of the mind is complete….the way in which you think about yourself, your body and your life manifests into your reality. It’s so easy for negative thoughts to turn into lack of confidence, hopelessness, despair and depression. And to comfort yourself with your favorite soul food, sit on the couch and stay stuck. It’s so easy for our views of ourselves to become self-fulfilling prophecies.

There are many things you can do to course correct. You can:
•Meditate/pray/journal each morning, focusing on your daily goals. This gives purpose to your day.
•Each night, before you sleep, envision the ultimate you, the strong, healthy, happy, successful person that you dream yourself being.
•Be in gratitude. Before more is available to you, you must first be in gratitude of what you have. Be grateful for your body NOW. Be grateful for your health NOW. Be grateful for your life NOW.
•Keep track of your thoughts. For a few days, keep a journal with you and write down the negative thoughts that come to you. You may be surprised at how often they show up. And with that awareness, you can then begin to monitor them more closely and eventually begin to automatically substitute them with positive, life affirming thoughts until your unconscious disposition is more positively focused.

“I’m on a diet.” It could almost be the national slogan. With so many people attempting to lose weight, it’s amazing how little weight is actually lost and kept off. One of the reasons people find themselves dieting over and over again is they start their efforts without asking one important question: “Am I ready?” To help you find the answer, ask yourself a few more questions:

What’s My Motivation?
Think about your reason for wanting to lose weight and decide if it’s enough to support a long-range commitment. Are you dieting to get ready for the swimsuit season or because your doctor told you your next heart attack could be fatal? Weight loss that’s permanent is more often the result of long-term health considerations than of short-term goals, such as the upcoming class reunion.

Can I Cope With One More Change?
If you’ve just gone through an important change in your life — a divorce, job change, extra stress at work, even a positive change, such as a marriage or new baby — consider postponing changes in your diet and exercise habits. Too much change at once can push you into the high-stress zone.

Am I Willing To Be Realistic?
Perhaps the major reason diets fail is the dieter hopes to shed a large amount of weight in a hurry, to get quick results — and a quick end to the diet. If you expect to be able to lose weight and then on with your life (meaning, go back to your old habits, you are setting yourself up for failure. Your diet isn’t a temporary measure rather than a lifelong change in eating and exercise habits which actually be amazingly enjoyable and fun!

Do I Have Time And Energy?
Experts say that exercise is an important component of any weight-loss program. Are you willing to make walking, jogging, swimming, or an aerobics class a permanent part of your daily life?

How Will Others React?
A supportive and understanding network of family and friends can help you enormously. Do you expect your family to partake of your new healthy recipes? Do you want them to cheer you on, nag you when you lapse, or just leave you alone? Talk over your plans with your loved ones. What are their expectations and fears? For instance, your spouse may worry that as you lose weight, you’ll become too attractive to others. Or your mother may feel rejected if you don’t eat that second helping.

Losing weight permanently requires a major life change, not just another diet. Your answers to the above questions can help you decide if now is the time to start.

Source: www.HealthCoachingU.com